I-90 Closure Information

Information courtesy of the WSDOT Blog…

By now, hopefully you’ve heard that westbound Interstate 90 will be reduced to one lane at Bellevue Way Southeast from 9:30 p.m. Friday, July 18 until 5 a.m. Friday, July 25. That’s 24-hours-a-day for a week, and yes, it’s going to be messy.

During that time, contractor crews are going to be replacing two huge, old expansion joints embedded deep in the roadway near Mercer Island. They’re 33-years-old and despite repairs over the years, they are at the end of their useful life.Construction detailsThese expansion joints are massive, much bigger than those on I-5. Each of the 33-year-old joints are 92-feet long and weigh almost 29 tons. They’re embedded into 11-inch-thick concrete. Chipping out the concrete, replacing the joints, pouring new concrete and letting that concrete cure for a minimum of 12 hours would take longer than a typical weekend-long closure allows. Once in place, between 24 – 30 hours of welding is needed to connect both sides of the new joints.

If you don’t plan ahead, your typical commute could last an hour or more. The best advice is to avoid using westbound I-90 during the closure. With a big Sounders match and the Mariners in town, along with work and other trips, we know that’s not easy. Taking an alternate route will help, but still add extra time to your trip because other routes will be affected with folks doing the same thing. If you can telework, or even take a vacation, this would be the week to do it.

When we had two lanes closed on westbound I-90 floating bridge in July 2009, we saw up to 7-mile backups, but we had the express lanes to help. On this closure we do not. Congestion could be much worse this time around. To keep delays from really getting horrible, we need at least 60 percent of drivers to adjust their plans. We recognize that’s a lot to ask, but every person who can change their plans helps.

The graph below shows that normal peak travel times on westbound I-90 in the closure area are up to 15 minutes in the morning, up to 30 in the afternoon. If we get a 60 percent diversion during the closure, we still expect morning travel times to be 45 minutes to 1 hour, and a little longer in the afternoon. So if there’s any way for to you avoid the area that week, do it.

We wouldn’t do this closure if we didn’t have to but it’s vital to maintaining our infrastructure and avoiding emergency closures that would lead to having to replace the expansion joints anyway.

Tolls on SR 520Folks have asked us about tolls on SR 520 during construction on I-90. SR 520 is just one route from the Eastside to Seattle. The Transportation Commission sets toll rates and exemptions and there are none for this project or other construction closures. Drivers can set up a short-term account and can save $.50 on the pay-by-mail toll rate.

About Lydia

Lydia Cruz has been on the airwaves with Brooke & Jubal in the Morning for the last four years. She's a local traffic whisperer, style blogger, notorious Boner Killer and the whitest Latina you know. Lydia is a proud Seattle native with a shameless coffee addiction to prove it. If she's not at work she's outdoors in the PNW. She loves running, playing with her dogs, snowboarding and yoga - her friends know her as the girl that never stops moving. Unless of course she breaks to watch Game of Thrones. Look out for her at concerts as "that one girl dancing."